1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments described herein relate to a musical sound generation instrument and a computer readable medium in which musical sound data generated by pushing keys and stored audio data cooperate with each other.
2. Description of the Related Art
The function commonly called “automatic accompaniment” is well known in electronic musical instruments. According to a typical automatic accompaniment function, data of an automatic accompaniment pattern of a prescribed song (musical piece) is stored and musical sounds constituting an automatic accompaniment are generated while the stored data are read out sequentially at a prescribed tempo. A player plays a prescribed part (in general, a melody) by pushing keys with timing that is prescribed in the song while listening to the automatic accompaniment, whereby complete musical sounds of the song are generated.
The automatic accompaniment pattern is configured so that musical sounds corresponding to prescribed chords are generated with sound generation timing of a prescribed accompaniment sequence. The automatic accompaniment pattern may include obbligato sounds of a countermelody and rhythm sounds.
Such an automatic accompaniment generates sounds in the same manner as musical sounds that are generated when a player manipulates keys. More specifically, a note-on event including a pitch and a tone is sent to a sound source section with sound generation timing indicated by an automatic accompaniment sequence and the sound source section reads waveform data, that is, reads data of the specified tone at a speed corresponding to the specified pitch, from a ROM which is stored with waveform data, whereby musical sound waveform data of the specified tone and pitch is output.
In an electronic musical instrument having such an automatic accompaniment function, a player is not necessarily skilled in playing of a song; he or she may not be able to push a key with correct timing or may push an erroneous key. JP-A-2000-206965 and 2007-114539 disclose electronic musical instruments which, even in such a case, prevent an event that only the automatic accompaniment advances independently by adjusting the reading of data of an automatic accompaniment pattern.
On the other hand, an electronic musical instrument has been proposed which can reproduce both of musical sound waveform data generated by a sound source section and audio data received from another audio apparatus such as an audio player or audio data produced by sampling an audio signal picked up by a microphone or the like.
For example, an apparatus is conceivable which reproduces such audio data as an automatic accompaniment and reproduces, as melody sounds, musical sound waveform data that is generated by a sound source section based on key manipulations of a player. Since audio data is read out at a fixed sampling frequency, this apparatus has a problem that it is difficult to control the reading of the audio data so that it conforms to a play of a player when he or she cannot push keys with correct timing.